throw your soul through every open door
by irishais
Summary: Quistis Trepe came to Balamb School for the Arts to follow her dream, but could rockstar-wannabe Seifer Almasy be her future? AU.


___A/N: I'd just like to point out that I didn't write most of the lyrics I'll be using in this fic; basically, if you recognize it, I don't own it.  
_

* * *

_throw your soul through every open door_

_-irishais-_

ONE.

Balamb School for the Arts was a strange, sprawling campus set a couple miles outside of the smallest town Quistis Trepe had ever seen, and the first time she set foot off the train from Deling City, she was half-tempted to get right back on and leave.

But BSA was respected. Some of the best names in dance came from there, and it wasn't like there was anything waiting for her back in Galbadia, outside of a lifetime in law school, in her father's firm, making money hand over fist and being bored out of her mind. This was the last shot.

Two years later found her lying awake in her bed, running through her routine for the winter showcase over and over again, and coming up blank right in the middle. She rolled on her side, glancing at the clock on her bedside table. It glowed midnight at her, mockingly.

When it ticked over to 12:01, she gave up on sleep entirely, tossing aside her light comforter. The rehearsal halls were open all night, kept in their own separate wing of Balamb, just for situations like these. She would go, work it out, maybe see if something would happen. It wasn't like she would lose anything more than sleep over it.

Her roommate was sneaking into the dorm room just as Quistis was headed for the door, her bag slung over her shoulder.

"God," Xu said, dropping her purse on the counter. "You scared the shit out of me."

"Same to you. How was the party?"

Her roommate shrugged. "Okay. Good music, but Zell ate like nine hotdogs and we had to leave. Where are you headed?"

Quistis opened the miniature refrigerator and pulled out a bottle of water, tucking it into the side pocket of her bag. "The studio. I want to work on my routine. I'll be quiet when I come back in."

"You're always quiet," Xu quipped. "I forget you live here sometimes."

"Ha, ha. See you later."

xx

The halls of BSA were sparsely populated after midnight; officially, only second and third year students could be out of their rooms after ten, but unless someone was being ridiculously disruptive, the night-shift staff rarely stopped anyone.

Quistis hung a left out of the dorm wing, following the huge fountain in the lobby around until she got to the corridor leading to the workspaces, her footsteps echoing in the silence. It was soothing, really, a balm against the grating, screaming pitch of the school during daylight hours.

The guitar pouring out of the door to the dance studio surprised the hell out of her.

xx

Seifer Almasy ran his fingers down the strings and climbed the alphabet back up again.

The chords echoed pleasingly around the studio, and he liked the way they sounded, so he did it again. His battered notebook was open next to him; Seifer paused long enough to pick up his pencil and scribble a note in the margin.

The song was there, just out of his reach. He hated that feeling- it was keeping him up at night, fiddling in his room, trying out lyrics and scrapping them nearly as quickly. He'd given up a few hours ago, hauling his guitar down to one of the recording studios. It had only taken him twenty minutes in there before he knew it wasn't going to encourage _any _sort of productivity.

The dance studio was empty, big, close enough to the acoustics of one the smaller auditoriums to work. He'd stolen a chair from the art room across the hall and had been here ever since.

The notes spilling out from under his fingers now were wandering, aimless, forming into a segment from a song he already knew and morphing into something different just as quickly. He tried a passage three different times, in flat and sharp and in minor keys entirely. He hummed, tapped his feet, tried every trick in the book.

He sang, snatches and fragments, lines picked out of dreams. The snippets had been lingering in his head for days now, waiting to be solidified into something more, but practice was better than nothing.

-_the world is burning_

_down around our heads_

_and all I've got is-_

The door creaked open. Seifer stopped, cutting himself off mid-note. "Occupied," he called, absently.

"Sorry. I didn't realize someone was in here." A girl, some blonde dance student, because who the hell else would be in here at this hour? She hovered in the doorway, clutching the strap of her bag.

He made a sweeping gesture, encompassing the guitar and himself. His reflection mimicked him twenty times over, in the long rows of mirrors across from him. "Obviously."

"Sorry," she repeated. "It's just... this is the dance studio-"

"No," he interjected. She wasn't going to leave, it seemed. "It's fine. I'm done here."

"Really?"

Seifer shrugged, pulling the strap for his guitar over his head and setting it carefully back into its battered hard case. "It's no big deal, really. All yours."

The girl set her bag down near the door, surprised, apparently, at his easy acquiescence. "Thanks. You know, you're pretty good." She nodded toward his guitar.

"I thought you said you didn't know anyone was here." He smirked; she blushed. He thought about introducing himself, and dismissed the idea. She was pretty, but in that weird uptight way that only meant trouble. "Well, have a nice night."

As he walked away down the hall, classical music started up in his wake. At least she didn't have to worry about her music.

xx

_Don't want to hear about it_

_Every single one's got a story to tell_

_Everyone knows about it_

_From the Queen of England to the hounds of hell_

He had a stranglehold on the microphone, belting the lyrics out, Irvine backing him up on a wailing electric guitar. Their instructor watched them with a critical eye, tapping her pencil against the clipboard in her lap, keeping track of the beat better than most metronomes.

_And if I catch it coming back my way_

_I'm gonna serve it to you_

_And that aint what you want to hear_

_But thats what I'll do_

_And the feeling coming from my bones_

_Says find a home_

Rinoa Heartilly was looking right at him, dancing in her seat, mouthing along with the words, and Seifer grinned at her around the mike. Irvine carried the song into its final stanza, and Seifer counted off the beats- this beat the _shit _out of public school in Balamb.

_All the words are gonna bleed from me_

_And I will sing no more_

_And the stains coming from my blood_

_Tell me go back home_

The classroom erupted into applause as the song wound down, and the instructor nodded, looking at her notes.

"Good, guys. Seifer, don't stretch the vocals so far- you need to rein it in just a little. I want you to tighten that up and do it again next class."

"Sure," he said. "Okay."

Instructor Willow flipped through her sheaf of critique sheets, and settles on the next name. "Nida, you're up." A skinny, mousy boy got up out of his chair, nearly knocking over another student with his instrument case, and Seifer ceded the stage to him, returning to his seat.

Rinoa nudged his leg with her sparkly gold sandal. He glanced over at her.

"I thought it was hot," she whispered. "You should come help me rehearse sometime."

"Rinoa," Willow called. "Pay attention."

Rinoa tossed her hair over her shoulder and shot Seifer one more flirtatious look before she turned her attention back to the stage. Seifer chuckled, clasping his hands together behind his head. And to think, his foster mom wanted him to work on the docks.

xx

She danced, moving in a dizzying series of emboites, her turns sharp, her jumps solid.

"Higher," Instructor Grieves calls. "Don't be afraid to _push_."

She leaped again, again, again. The music was a thunderous drumbeat, pulsing in her veins. She _was _pushing herself, as hard as she could, her legs burning with the effort. The dance studio never seemed so large, and it seemed to take an eternity to get to the other side.

Quistis stopped inches shy of the bar, gasping with the exertion. She leaned against the bar, catching her breath. Her reflection was red-faced, sweaty; she would murder for a shower.

"Better," Grieves told her, but her attention diverted from Quistis to the other dancers so quickly that she may as well have not said anything at all. Quistis sighed, wiping the sweat back off of her face and joining the knot of dancers near the door, all ready to hit the changing room and be done with this.

Eventually, the bell rang.

"Good work, everyone," Instructor Grieves said.

Quistis applauded briefly with the rest of the class, out of reflex. She had expected something more from this- Grieves was respected, one of the best instructors at Balamb, and she was _so _excited to gain one of the spots in this class, expecting solid critique and instruction.

Instead, she got... nothing. It was baffling compared to the instruction she received in Deling's dance academy. _No wonder the routine isn't coming together_, a snide voice whispered in her head. It was impossible to catch Grieves for five minutes to talk about anything, much less what would a life-changing performance like her winter showcase routine. _All _the major companies would there, waiting to offer jobs to a very few select dancers.

At this rate, she would be back in the stacks at Deling U before she knew it.

The cafeteria was loud, obnoxiously so, and it took ten minutes to get through the line. She swiped her ID card in exchange for her salad and bottled water, and carried her tray to the first table she could find, not bothering to seek out Xu amidst the crowd. Her roommate rarely managed to get out of her class on time, anyway.

The table she found was small, shoved away in a corner, and she set her tray down just narrowly ahead of a guy making a beeline for it, deliberately ignoring him as she worked the foil off of her salad.

"Shit, please tell me you're eating alone."

Quistis glanced up. "I was planning on it, yes. Oh- it's... you."

Her intruder snorted. "Nice to see you again, too, fellow night-owl." He set his overly full tray down opposite her, and she stared as he took the empty chair. "Oh, come on, it's the least you can do for spying on me last night."

She could feel her cheeks redden, and she sputtered, "I was not spying. I was going to use the _ballet_ studio that you happened to be using for your... jam session."

"Better acoustic," the boy said, unwrapping a burger that made Quistis feel like her arteries were shrinking in sympathy. "I never caught your name, by the way."

"You never told me yours. Why would I tell you mine?"

He inspected the burger, plucking out a good portion of the lettuce and half the tomato. "Touche. Seifer Almasy, resident ballet studio-crasher."

"Quistis," she responded automatically. There was something about this boy that made her want to get up and run, but at the same time he was so easy, so carefree that she couldn't help but be a little envious.

"Quistis," he repeated, stretching the word out, making it sound a little like music. "A pleasure to meet you."

Something hot knotted inside of her with the way he said her name, and Quistis turned her full attention back to her terrible salad before she could say something she might regret.


End file.
